11.6 Selected response items

Common formal assessment formats used by teachers are multiple choice, matching, and true/false items . In selected response items students have to select a response provided by the teacher or test developer rather than constructing a response in their own words or actions. Selected response items do not require that students recall the information but rather recognize the correct answer. Tests with these items are called objective because the results are not influenced by scorers’ judgments or interpretations and so are often machine scored. Eliminating potential errors in scoring increases the reliability of tests but teachers who only use objective tests are liable to reduce the validity of their assessment because objective tests are not appropriate for all learning goals (Linn&Miller, 2005). Effective assessment for learning as well as assessment of learning must be based on aligning the assessment technique to the learning goals and outcomes.

For example, if the goal is for students to conduct an experiment then they should be asked to do that rather that than being asked about conducting an experiment.

Common problems

Selected response items are easy to score but are hard to devise. Teachers often do not spend enough time constructing items and common problems include:

1. Unclear wording in the items
   • True or False: Although George Washington was born into a wealthy family, his father died when he was only 11, he worked as a youth as a surveyor of rural lands, and later stood on the balcony of Federal Hall in New York when he took his oath of office in 1789.
2. Cues that are not related the content being examined.
   • A common clue is that all the true statements on a true/false test or the corrective alternatives on a multiple choice test are longer than the untrue statements or the incorrect alternatives.
3. Using negatives (or double negatives) the items.
   • A poor item. “True or False: None of the steps made by the student was unnecessary.”
   • A better item. True or False: “All of the steps were necessary.”

   Students often do not notice the negative terms or find them confusing so avoiding them is generally recommended (Linn&Miller 2005 ). However, since standardized tests often use negative items, teachers sometimes deliberately include some negative items to give students practice in responding to that format.

4. Taking sentences directly from textbook or lecture notes.

   Removing the words from their context often makes them ambiguous or can change the meaning. For example, a statement from Chapter 3 taken out of context suggests all children are clumsy. “Similarly with jumping, throwing and catching: the large majority of children can do these things, though often a bit clumsily.” A fuller quotation makes it clearer that this sentence refers to 5-year-olds: For some fives, running still looks a bit like a hurried walk, but usually it becomes more coordinated within a year or two. Similarly with jumping, throwing and catching: the large majority of children can do these things, though often a bit clumsily, by the time they start school, and most improve their skills noticeably during the early elementary years. ” If the abbreviated form was used as the stem in a true/false item it would obviously be misleading.

5. Avoid trivial questions

   e.g. Jean Piaget was born in what year?

   1. 1896
   2. 1900
   3. 1880
   4. 1903

   While it important to know approximately when Piaget made his seminal contributions to the understanding of child development, the exact year of his birth (1880) is not important.